Commentary on Genesis 22-34
The stories in Biblical Literacy this week are in Genesis, Chapter 22 (The Binding of Isaac), Chapter 28: 10 (Jacob’s Ladder), Chapter 32 (Jacob Wrestling with an Angel), and Chapter 34: (The Rape of Dinah).
The test that Abraham is subjected to by God has long been my most hated story in the bible. I’m sure part of the reason is that I have an only son whom I love dearly. The idea of being asked to kill him for no good reason except to appease a God who likes that kind of sacrifice is abhorrent to me. I’m sure I would have said NO, and failed the test miserably.
Lots of fathers have their sons taken from them by war and accidents and disease and crime and drugs. Can they find consolation in this story? Can they honestly say: It’s only God, testing my faith. Can they be like Job and promise: Even if He kills me and all that is mine, I’ll still remain faithful and loving to Him? I doubt it. This is different. This is the father killing his son because of some moral imperative, some vision, some voice in his head!
Is it enough to say here that ‘God’s ways are not human ways?’
There is a lot of room for discussion here. This is supposed to be the faith by which Abraham was justified (see Romans 4), long before Jesus was born, died and was raised. Maybe Abraham’s faith was such that he didn’t really believe his son would have to die. Maybe he already had certainty about the angel who would stop the knife at the last moment. Maybe he already knew what he would say afterwards to a son who surely would question and be afraid forever of his father who had him tied up like a goat to be slaughtered.
When these thoughts raise the hairs on the back of my neck, I have to shake my head and laugh at myself. Here I am, who am always preaching against taking the bible literally, TAKING IT LITERALLY! Dr. Beal’s book is not called “Biblical Literalness.” And so I have to back off and recognize that this oral tradition that got imprisoned in the Book of Genesis is consistent with an ancient idea of God. This ancient context is of a God who could demand human sacrifice and murder (see the story of Dinah), but who preferred animal sacrifice instead.
When I get caught up in all labyrinthine paths to and from this story, I feel like Jacob in Chapter 32--I am wrestling with God and am wounded. I find myself extremely grateful that we Christians can look to Jesus for new ways to think about and relate to God. Jesus is our Jacob’s ladder, leading us upward to better ideas of God that do not taint Him with our anthropomorphic addiction to violence. And maybe that’s the ultimate message of the Dinah story, too (Jacob’s reaction)—that not all conflict has to be resolved with killing and violence.
Jacob awoke from his dream and his wrestling—wounded, yes, but with a clear idea that “God is in this place.” And we, too, awake from our musings and our struggles through life with the same faith: “God is here, supporting us, urging us toward better and better solutions.”
NEXT week: pages 36-43.
Friday, October 28, 2011
Friday, October 21, 2011
Comments on Genesis 11-19; Biblical Literacy Pages 21-29
Commentary on Genesis 11:1-9, 16:1-6, 18:1-15, and 18:16 – 19:29
There are four stories here: The Tower of Babel, the Birth of Ishmael, the Prediction of the Conception of Isaac, and the Destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Are there any connections between these four?
The New Interpreter’s Study Bible says the Tower of Babel story shows that humans wanted homogeneity, but God wanted diversity! The NISB downplays the human pride and hubris that are usually associated with this tale. Indeed, Genesis seems to take great pains to show the close blood relationships between tribes sired by the same father, and then describe the tensions that also erupt to stand as barriers among them. It’s as if they are saying to each other: “We are related! You are my brothers! And yet we hate each other, are strangers to each other, and must eventually go to war!” Does not this story keep playing out over and over through the centuries?
How people treat one another is pictured as a great concern of the Most High God. As an horrific example, NISB states that the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah is not because of homosexuality, but because of the oppression of the poor and the alien! Abraham can’t find even ten people who are just.
Some think that Sodom and Gomorrah were situated on the southern shores of the Dead Sea, and the turning of Lot’s wife into a pillar of salt explains the actual pillars of salt that can be found in that desolate environment.
D.H. Lawrence refers to Lots’ wife in his anguished poem “She Looks Back,” This is a poem about his regret for a lover and a mother who can’t forget the children she left behind in England, and so can’t relate wholeheartedly to him. The poem can create a new sympathy for Lot’s wife who, like Abraham, can’t forget their friends and relatives in those doomed cities.
With all of this doom and gloom, some laughter is welcome, and Genesis supplies it in the story of Sarah. God is pictured as carrying on with his plan. He is going to bring out the best in these humans, despite their outrageous behavior to each other. Just as there are just and sterling individuals, like Abraham, so also God will cause there to be a whole people who will be a model for other nations and a channel for hope in the world. The flood is behind Him, and Genesis shows again and again that it is the loving action of God that brings about blessing and not the impotent attempts of men.
As modern spiritual writers express this, God loves us more than we can love ourselves. Despite our pushing and shoving, He is always working to bring about our ultimate happiness.
There are four stories here: The Tower of Babel, the Birth of Ishmael, the Prediction of the Conception of Isaac, and the Destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Are there any connections between these four?
The New Interpreter’s Study Bible says the Tower of Babel story shows that humans wanted homogeneity, but God wanted diversity! The NISB downplays the human pride and hubris that are usually associated with this tale. Indeed, Genesis seems to take great pains to show the close blood relationships between tribes sired by the same father, and then describe the tensions that also erupt to stand as barriers among them. It’s as if they are saying to each other: “We are related! You are my brothers! And yet we hate each other, are strangers to each other, and must eventually go to war!” Does not this story keep playing out over and over through the centuries?
How people treat one another is pictured as a great concern of the Most High God. As an horrific example, NISB states that the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah is not because of homosexuality, but because of the oppression of the poor and the alien! Abraham can’t find even ten people who are just.
Some think that Sodom and Gomorrah were situated on the southern shores of the Dead Sea, and the turning of Lot’s wife into a pillar of salt explains the actual pillars of salt that can be found in that desolate environment.
D.H. Lawrence refers to Lots’ wife in his anguished poem “She Looks Back,” This is a poem about his regret for a lover and a mother who can’t forget the children she left behind in England, and so can’t relate wholeheartedly to him. The poem can create a new sympathy for Lot’s wife who, like Abraham, can’t forget their friends and relatives in those doomed cities.
With all of this doom and gloom, some laughter is welcome, and Genesis supplies it in the story of Sarah. God is pictured as carrying on with his plan. He is going to bring out the best in these humans, despite their outrageous behavior to each other. Just as there are just and sterling individuals, like Abraham, so also God will cause there to be a whole people who will be a model for other nations and a channel for hope in the world. The flood is behind Him, and Genesis shows again and again that it is the loving action of God that brings about blessing and not the impotent attempts of men.
As modern spiritual writers express this, God loves us more than we can love ourselves. Despite our pushing and shoving, He is always working to bring about our ultimate happiness.
Monday, October 10, 2011
Comments on Genesis 4-10; Biblical Literacy 15-21
I attended a reunion of LaGuardias this summer, arranged by my wonderfully gregarious cousins of the southwest metropolitan area. You get quite a feeling of pride and belonging when you enter a group of over 100 people, young and old, kids running around all over the place, and know that all of them have some blood ties to you and you to them.
One of my cousins tried to write down these relationships in the form of a genealogy that stretched at least ten feet long on butcher block paper. But when I looked at it closely, I could see how many mistakes he had in just my own immediate family.
And so I can imagine the mistakes that might have been made when the authors of Genesis attempted to write down their ancestry (through only males, by the way) as it came down to them in several traditions (the Priestly and the Yahwist) about a time existing long before the monarchy in Israel when they were writing—a time that we now call “pre-history.”
As I was about to leave the reunion, one of my cousins called me aside for a private conversation. He had some questions about my father, my uncle and my grandfather that he thought I might know the answers to. Their relationships were important to him.
Similarly, the relationships of Israel to her neighbors were extremely important to her. The Genesis stories are replete with rivalries between brothers, beginning with Cain and Abel, and extending to Joseph and his brothers. And in between were the brothers sired by Noah. The very first story after the departure from Eden involves one brother murdering another. Some brothers get blessed and some get cursed.
God is pictured as experiencing the same anguish that he foretold women would suffer during childbirth when he sees the bottomless pits of evil that his human beings are capable of. And after he “recreates” the world following the Flood, there are lots and lots of examples of war, violence and killing among people who supposedly descended from the same ancestors. But there is also that wonderful image of the “bow” in the sky. The bow was a weapon, sometimes described as a weapon of the gods, but here it is, in beautiful color, offering a promise of peace and an alternative way to solve what seem to be inevitable conflicts among brothers.
In his textbook on educational philosophy (Gutek, G. (2009) New Perspectives on Philosophy and Education), Gerald Gutek has a chapter on “ethnonationalism” which shows how ethnic groups build a common history, purpose, and a great deal of patriotic fervor on the stories of their ancestors and their past history. These stories don’t have to be all that factual; they just are the accepted stories of the tribe or nation. They often convey: “Our family is the best!”
If we can remove ourselves from the need to find Noah’s Ark or to trace the genealogies historically or to place the exact coordinates of the garden of Eden,
we can start to appreciate the spiritual richness of the Genesis stories. They explain about the evil that is in the heart of man; they show examples of working out conflict without violence, and above all, they exhibit a strong faith in a Creator God, who again and again can’t leave these flawed humans alone; can’t bear to destroy them all; wants to be their God and even enter into an agreement with them.
The message ringing through these first chapters of Genesis may still be sounding for us in 2011: “We are brothers and sisters, and there is hope for us all!” Genesis does not offer proof that God exists; it offers an invitation to believe.
One of my cousins tried to write down these relationships in the form of a genealogy that stretched at least ten feet long on butcher block paper. But when I looked at it closely, I could see how many mistakes he had in just my own immediate family.
And so I can imagine the mistakes that might have been made when the authors of Genesis attempted to write down their ancestry (through only males, by the way) as it came down to them in several traditions (the Priestly and the Yahwist) about a time existing long before the monarchy in Israel when they were writing—a time that we now call “pre-history.”
As I was about to leave the reunion, one of my cousins called me aside for a private conversation. He had some questions about my father, my uncle and my grandfather that he thought I might know the answers to. Their relationships were important to him.
Similarly, the relationships of Israel to her neighbors were extremely important to her. The Genesis stories are replete with rivalries between brothers, beginning with Cain and Abel, and extending to Joseph and his brothers. And in between were the brothers sired by Noah. The very first story after the departure from Eden involves one brother murdering another. Some brothers get blessed and some get cursed.
God is pictured as experiencing the same anguish that he foretold women would suffer during childbirth when he sees the bottomless pits of evil that his human beings are capable of. And after he “recreates” the world following the Flood, there are lots and lots of examples of war, violence and killing among people who supposedly descended from the same ancestors. But there is also that wonderful image of the “bow” in the sky. The bow was a weapon, sometimes described as a weapon of the gods, but here it is, in beautiful color, offering a promise of peace and an alternative way to solve what seem to be inevitable conflicts among brothers.
In his textbook on educational philosophy (Gutek, G. (2009) New Perspectives on Philosophy and Education), Gerald Gutek has a chapter on “ethnonationalism” which shows how ethnic groups build a common history, purpose, and a great deal of patriotic fervor on the stories of their ancestors and their past history. These stories don’t have to be all that factual; they just are the accepted stories of the tribe or nation. They often convey: “Our family is the best!”
If we can remove ourselves from the need to find Noah’s Ark or to trace the genealogies historically or to place the exact coordinates of the garden of Eden,
we can start to appreciate the spiritual richness of the Genesis stories. They explain about the evil that is in the heart of man; they show examples of working out conflict without violence, and above all, they exhibit a strong faith in a Creator God, who again and again can’t leave these flawed humans alone; can’t bear to destroy them all; wants to be their God and even enter into an agreement with them.
The message ringing through these first chapters of Genesis may still be sounding for us in 2011: “We are brothers and sisters, and there is hope for us all!” Genesis does not offer proof that God exists; it offers an invitation to believe.
Monday, October 3, 2011
Comments on Genesis 1-3, Biblical Literacy 1-15
Comments for October 9, 2011
It is time to jump right into the first three chapters of the book of Genesis. With the leaves changing color and beginning to fall, it is a fitting metaphor to take a flying leap into the gorgeous shades of meaning that fall out from this wonderful book.
If you watch the first session of Bill Moyers’ Genesis, either by streaming it on Netflix or by going to pbs.org, you will first note that he has assembled a VERY prestigious group of people with whom to carry on this discussion. But they each bring something different from their own knowledge and experience: some know Hebrew and the rabbinic traditions about Genesis; one is an artist and has some incisive things to say about ‘creation.’ One professor had just recovered from a very recent heart attack and so had some comments about the value of life; many were married and were interested in the relationship between Adam and Eve, and between parents and children. All had intense questions about the image of God portrayed in Genesis, and of course they ran into the barbed wire question about the problem of evil.
After an hour’s discussion, the video just fades out. No conclusions are drawn; no take-aways; no homework. It was like watching a creation in miniature—sparks of life erupting from the minds and hearts of these people and illuminating the room, causing other ideas to burst forth like so many bubbles of light. Bill Moyers did ask questions, but usually only to follow up on someone’s observations. In fact, he doesn’t even start the discussion.
Dr. Beal’s book, Biblical Literacy, will be like Moyers’ facilitation. He writes very little. He likes to point out later art, music and literature that have their origin and inspiration from the biblical texts. He relishes the idea of showing us how pervasive words from the Bible are in our everyday speech, and in the speeches and songs of our political and entertainment celebrities. It will be interesting to see if these allusions provoke discussion and to see if we ourselves will be inspired by the scripture.
This is a different way of looking at the Bible, very unlike the heavy academic approach of textual criticism and close, exegetical interpretation. Far less time will be spent in asking who wrote things and when. The arguments of the scholars over disputed readings and authorship will be pushed to the background. The important thing will be to look at the text, swim around in it, and attempt to make meaning.
Genesis is a great place to start. There are things to discuss, such as the image of God that comes through, the relationship of God to us, the position of women, the tree of knowledge, the banishment from Eden, the promise of hope. We may even want to get into whether God was creating out of nothing or simply drawing order out of chaos. We may want to ask if that process is still continuing today, and what our role is in it.
Will we be like a group of middle schoolers discussing sex during recess, not knowing much about it, but feeling free to share their expert opinions? Will it be prudent to ignore any scholarship? Shall we put ourselves back into an age when people did not or could not read to see what fresh insights we come up with? Can we safely ignore sentences like this from the New Interpreter’s Study Bible: “Readers today should understand the structural differences between ancient and modern societies and be careful about using ancient social norms as models for modern ethics” (p. 11)?
We are going to proceed. What jumps out at you as you read these chapters; which colorful leaves you press in the book of your life—these are the important things to bring to our discussion. Then, would it be too bold to say that, like the Creator, we’ll see what happens!
It is time to jump right into the first three chapters of the book of Genesis. With the leaves changing color and beginning to fall, it is a fitting metaphor to take a flying leap into the gorgeous shades of meaning that fall out from this wonderful book.
If you watch the first session of Bill Moyers’ Genesis, either by streaming it on Netflix or by going to pbs.org, you will first note that he has assembled a VERY prestigious group of people with whom to carry on this discussion. But they each bring something different from their own knowledge and experience: some know Hebrew and the rabbinic traditions about Genesis; one is an artist and has some incisive things to say about ‘creation.’ One professor had just recovered from a very recent heart attack and so had some comments about the value of life; many were married and were interested in the relationship between Adam and Eve, and between parents and children. All had intense questions about the image of God portrayed in Genesis, and of course they ran into the barbed wire question about the problem of evil.
After an hour’s discussion, the video just fades out. No conclusions are drawn; no take-aways; no homework. It was like watching a creation in miniature—sparks of life erupting from the minds and hearts of these people and illuminating the room, causing other ideas to burst forth like so many bubbles of light. Bill Moyers did ask questions, but usually only to follow up on someone’s observations. In fact, he doesn’t even start the discussion.
Dr. Beal’s book, Biblical Literacy, will be like Moyers’ facilitation. He writes very little. He likes to point out later art, music and literature that have their origin and inspiration from the biblical texts. He relishes the idea of showing us how pervasive words from the Bible are in our everyday speech, and in the speeches and songs of our political and entertainment celebrities. It will be interesting to see if these allusions provoke discussion and to see if we ourselves will be inspired by the scripture.
This is a different way of looking at the Bible, very unlike the heavy academic approach of textual criticism and close, exegetical interpretation. Far less time will be spent in asking who wrote things and when. The arguments of the scholars over disputed readings and authorship will be pushed to the background. The important thing will be to look at the text, swim around in it, and attempt to make meaning.
Genesis is a great place to start. There are things to discuss, such as the image of God that comes through, the relationship of God to us, the position of women, the tree of knowledge, the banishment from Eden, the promise of hope. We may even want to get into whether God was creating out of nothing or simply drawing order out of chaos. We may want to ask if that process is still continuing today, and what our role is in it.
Will we be like a group of middle schoolers discussing sex during recess, not knowing much about it, but feeling free to share their expert opinions? Will it be prudent to ignore any scholarship? Shall we put ourselves back into an age when people did not or could not read to see what fresh insights we come up with? Can we safely ignore sentences like this from the New Interpreter’s Study Bible: “Readers today should understand the structural differences between ancient and modern societies and be careful about using ancient social norms as models for modern ethics” (p. 11)?
We are going to proceed. What jumps out at you as you read these chapters; which colorful leaves you press in the book of your life—these are the important things to bring to our discussion. Then, would it be too bold to say that, like the Creator, we’ll see what happens!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)